Unnatural Relations

by Mike Seabroook

  "But will he keep his promises?" asked Lane.

  "I can't speak for him. He won't commit suicide, that I'm sure of. He's not the sort. He wouldn't have done what he did this morning if he hadn't been overwrought and depressed. He's far too tough to do anything like that when he's himself. As for the other promises, well, I think he meant what he said. I hope he did."

  "Should I allow you to write to him, Christopher, would you promise me that you would not seek to see Jamie without my express permission?" was Lane's next question.

  "Yes, sir, I'd promise you that," said Christopher, making mental apologies to Lane, for whom he had conceived a great respect. He knew he was lying, and there was a brief internal struggle between Christopher and conscience. Christopher won on points. He mentally crossed his fingers, and waited for the next question.

  Lane looked very hard at Christopher. "You may have to wait for five years. Do you think you could do that, if you had to?"

  "Yes," said Christopher, with utter finality.

  "It can't be easy for you to say such a thing," said Lane. "How do you believe you'll cope with the waiting over the next - what? - year or so?"

  "I don't know," admitted Christopher. "All I know is that at this moment, it's breaking my heart. I love him, sir," he said inconsequentially. "I've been prosecuted and tried, convicted and sentenced, hounded, assaulted, insulted and abused for loving him, and now I'm being banished to my grandparents for loving him, but love him I do, and I can't help that - not that I want to. After what I've been through, waiting a while won't be much hardship."

  "Christopher," asked Edith Lane, speaking for the first time, "do you feel that your conviction was an injustice?" She watched him closely as he considered the question.

  "Yes, Mrs Lane, I do. I don't deny that I committed the offence I was charged with. But I deny that I did anything wrong." He tipped his glass up and drained the last few drops of lager, then sat for a minute, pondering the question. "Mrs Lane," he said at length, "while that sadist of a judge was making me wait over the lunch-break to find out what my sentence was, my lawyer talked to us - my parents and me - about a notice board."

  Seeing their puzzled expressions, he went on. "There's a park somewhere," he said, "with a notice board in it, which says 'It is forbidden to throw stones at this notice.' Mr Compton said that that's what I'd done, in his book. I'd thrown stones at that notice. He said that what I'd pleaded guilty to was breaking the law, and that I'd broken that law because it was there to be broken, that's all. He said it was being broken by hundreds of people as he was speaking, and by thousands every day of the week.

  "He said this law does no good to anyone, but it puts my entire emotional life on the level of a smutty joke, or a dirty book shop. I agree with that, Mrs Lane. He said this law makes no difference to anything or anybody except the odd unlucky one like me who gets caught by chance. The other nine hundred and ninety-nine carry on just the same, hoping they're luckier than I was.

  "He said I'd committed the offence of committing an offence, and all I was being pilloried for was for breaking the eleventh commandment. I think he's right, and I feel pretty bitter about it.

  "But the point is," he went on wearily, "that this isn't the point. It's all true, but it doesn't help me or Jamie right now. I've said, sir, I really think I've managed to convince Jamie that he's got to behave sensibly, and I don't think anyone else could have done it. But I don't think he'll stand by his promises, not even promises made to me, if he's denied all contact whatsoever. Sir, I'm desperately anxious to get a good degree. I should think you of all people would understand that and sympathise. Well, I'm not likely to do good work if I'm constantly out of my mind worrying about how Jamie is, what he's doing, and terrified all the time in case he turns up on the doorstep because he couldn't stand it any longer. And you know he'd be just as likely to do something like that.

  "I want that degree more than anything else in the world, Dr Lane, Mrs Lane - one thing excepted. The last thing I want is Jamie throwing spanners in the works. Please, sir, please help me to achieve that."

  Christopher slumped back in his chair. He had been desperately tired already, what with the chaotic events of the morning, the tedium of his hours of waiting in the afternoon and the emotional overload of worry and care over his beloved boy. The long, uninterrupted speech he had just had to improvise for the Lanes had added the final touch to his weariness. He looked from one to the other of them beseechingly, but he had nothing more to say for the moment.

  The Lanes sat silent, considering what he had said. Edith looked at her husband, and he saw her verdict clearly in her face. At last he spoke. "Christopher, I had felt all through this miserable business that it must probably have been mainly your fault that all this trouble arose. I thought a man of your age must have seen the problems that this affair with Jamie would bring in its train, and that it was your duty, in that knowledge, to refuse to proceed with it.

  "What I have seen of you today, however, has altered my feelings about you. I still can't tell you that I approve of this relationship. To begin with, it seems to me that you are both extremely young to be contemplating the kind of lifestyle that you are. However, I don't see that there is much I can do to persuade you of that, so there is little point in dwelling on that aspect of the matter. Meanwhile, may I say that I have felt nothing but admiration for you today. I think your action this morning showed a strength and resolution of character of a very high order - one might almost speak of heroism, perhaps..."

  "I'd rather you didn't," said Christopher, modestly.

  "The sentiment does you credit," said Lane. "Now, as to what you have come here to ask of us, I don't pretend to understand fully exactly how you and Jamie feel. I am, of course, familiar with homosexuality as a fact - as a phenomenon. But I'm afraid it's beyond me to imagine what goes on in the head or the emotions of someone like yourselves. None the less, I have heard your plea with some sympathy, and on balance, I believe you have made out your case."

  "You're beginning to sound like a lawyer yourself, John," commented Edith. They both looked across at her, and saw that she was laughing at him. "You're being most frightfully pompous," she went on. "You sound like a headmaster." She turned to Christopher. "I think I'd better deliver the verdict of the court, Christopher. Of course he's going to allow you to write to Jamie. It would be the grossest injustice to deny you that. Apart from that, it would be extremely ungrateful on our part, since you have probably done more in one afternoon to procure a peaceful next few months than we could have achieved ourselves in a month of Sundays. Am I right, John?"

  He had looked a little put out at having the initiative taken away from him in so peremptory and unexpected a fashion, but he saw the humorous glint in her eye, and laughed. "All right, Christopher, there's your decision, neatly taken off my toe and delivered unpompously. I was getting round to saying exactly the same, though I should perhaps have taken rather longer to say it. I agree with my wife. I think if you have managed to talk a little sense into Jamie, to talk some of the impetuosity and wilfulness out of him, then we shall owe you a great debt of gratitude. It will make our lives a lot easier over the coming months."

  He hesitated, then went on, "Added to that, I believe that it would in any case be unkind to deny the two of you the solace of writing to each other. One does not have to be persuaded by that young barrister, eloquent though he is, to feel that you deserve, at the lowest estimate, bare kindness. You have what you asked for, Christopher. I hope it will be some consolation to you both."

  Christopher sat up and, for the first time, smiled, and they knew then that they had made the right decision. "Thank you, Dr Lane, and you, Mrs Lane. I'm very grateful," he said. "I won't bother you any more." He got to his feet with an effort.

  "Will you let me drive you home, Christopher?" asked Lane. "You must be utterly exhausted after all the dramas of the day." Christopher gave him a grateful look. "Sit down for a minute, then," said Lane. "May I ask you
just one more question?"

  "Of course," said Christopher, sitting on the edge of the chair he had just vacated.

  "You have, quite clearly, a great deal of strength and firmness of character, Christopher. Do you feel that you could now do without Jamie altogether? I ask only out of -ah - academic interest."

  "No," said Christopher flatly. "I couldn't. If I knew this minute that I had to make a straight, single choice between Jamie and everything else - my degree, my career, being able to live in this country, the lot - I'd throw the lot up right now. It wouldn't be a choice. I'm not that strong. At the bottom of it all he'll always be the stronger. I've stepped in and taken control today, because I had to, because he took a tumble. But it was a case of him losing control, not me taking it. He'll be a very formidable man when he's older. I think I'm very lucky."

  Lane stood up, and the others followed suit. Christopher went across to Edith and offered his hand. "Goodbye, Mrs Lane. I shan't be disturbing your lives any more after this, but I'm very glad I've had the chance to meet you. And thank you for being so kind to us." She felt tears pricking at the back of her eyes as she took his hand. Looking very kindly on him, she said, "I'm very glad we've had the pleasure of meeting you. I think you're a remarkable young man, and I suspect that perhaps it's Jamie who's the lucky one. I hope you will soon be as lucky and as happy as you deserve to be. Goodbye, Christopher, and bless you."

  Lane took Christopher outside and got the car out of the garage. It was already dark. "You'll be going off to London tomorrow, I suppose?" he said as he put the car into gear and pulled away. "I imagine so," said Christopher. He was almost asleep.

  Lane drew up outside Christopher's house very differently from how he had arrived there at the start of the wild and whirling events of the morning. "It seems a very long time ago, doesn't it?" said Christopher, precisely echoing Lane's thoughts. "It certainly does, Christopher. For you more than any of us, I should think. You've had the hardest work to do today, by a long margin." Christopher turned towards him. Lane could see his eyes gleaming in the darkness of the car. He took the hand Christopher held out and shook it firmly. "Goodbye, Christopher," he said. "I agree with my wife, we owe you much gratitude for everything you have done today. I hope everything turns out well. I think, if you'll permit me to say it, that with the firm and honourable character that you clearly possess, it almost certainly will. Goodbye, my boy."

  Christopher got out of the car, and Lane watched him trudge wearily up to his front door. He extracted a key from his jeans and let himself in. Lane watched the door close behind him, then drove slowly away. At the end of Cross Oak Gardens he sat with his indicator casting a feeble intermittent orange glow over the road surface as he waited for a chance to turn out. As he swung out into the main road his mind moved ahead, scanning a long mental list of administrative jobs that had to be done. They had to visit Jamie in an hour or so, and there was a double period of Aristophanes with the sixth form on Monday morning to prepare.

  He settled down in a queue of home-bound evening traffic and switched on the radio. The car was filled with the plangent sounds of Debussy's faun, dozing for the rest of time in his eternal golden afternoon. Lane had a sudden mental picture of Christopher and Jamie, basking and frolicking in some enchanted Tempe. "Goodbye, Christopher," he murmured to himself as he turned into the Steeple Wynton road and headed for home. "And good luck."

  Postscript (June 1996)

  The reduction of the age of consent for male homosexuality from 21 to 18, in 1994, would have made no difference to the legal situation portrayed in this book. Any form of consensual sex with a boy under 16 is punishable with up to ten years’ imprisonment, and what the law persists in describing as ‘buggery’ carries a maximum life sentence. In theory, these penalties apply even when both partners are under age, and each year several youths under 18 are sent to prison for gay offences. Outrage! has recently launched a campaign ‘to reduce the age of consent to 14 for everyone’. This would bring Britain into line with European norms. Outrage! further argues that ‘sex involving young people under 14 should not be prosecuted, provided both partners consent and there is no more than three years’ difference in their ages’. Such flexibility already exists in German, Swiss, and Israeli law. Only under this proposal, still considered daringly radical in Britain today, would 19-year-old Christopher in this book be immune from prosecution.

  THE GA Y MEN’S PRESS COLLECTION

  bringing back into print some favorite books from The Gay Men’s Press

  Christopher Bram

  SURPRISING MYSELF

  Subtle and intricate in its depiction of human relationships, Surprising Myself sets its coming-out theme in a densely textured matrix of American society. Joel and Corey are two young men trying to build a life together in New York, amid the challenges and pitfalls of the gay scene, and the problems of work and family. Bram’s writing, profoundly realist yet dazzling in style, brings the reader into an impassioned and memorable intimacy with his characters.

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  Christopher Bram

  HOLD TIGHT

  When Hank Fayette, Seaman Second Class, uses his shore leave to visit a movie house on 42nd Street, he ends up in a gay brothel near Manhattan’s West Street piers, and is caught in a raid by the Shore Patrol. But it’s 1942, a few months after Pearl Harbor, and the US Navy sends Hank back to the brother to entrap Nazi agents.

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  Mike Seabrook

  OUT OF BOUNDS

  When handsome seventeen-year-old Stephen Hill joined the cricket club it was only a matter of time before young schoolmaster Graham Curtis fell head over heels in love. Their passionate affair intensified until the threat of exposure became too great. For safety they decided to part temporarily — but their commitment is tested more than they imagined, when Stephen is courted by his clever, irresistible classmate Richard, while Graham is blackmailed by a jealous former lover.

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  also by Mike Seabrook from The Gay Men’s Press:

  CONDUCT UNBECOMING

  Bright, idealistic, and a touch naive, 23-year-old Bob Chambers seems launched on a successful career in the Metropolitan Police. But one day he is assigned to the importuning squad, trusted with surveillance — and more — in public toilets. The drama that unfolds shows a complex conflict of loyalties, leading from Bob’s operation as agent provocateur to unsuspected discoveries about his own sexuality and the inevitable conflict with his superiors.

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  ISBN 0854491473

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  Quality new fiction from The Gay Men’s Press:

  Rudi van Dantzig

  FOR A LOST SOLDIER

  During the winter of 1944 in occupied Holland, eleven-year-old Jeroen is evacuated to a small fishing community on the desolate coast of Friesland, where he meets Walt, a young Canadian soldier with the liberating forces. Their relationship immerses the boy in a tumultuous world of emotional and sexual experience, suddenly curtailed when the Allies move on and Walt disappears. Back home in Amsterdam, a city in the throes of liberation fever, Jeroen searches for the soldier he has lost. A child’s fears and confused emotions have rarely been described with such depth of understanding, and seen as it is from the child's viewpoint it invites total empathy.

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  “A beautifully chronicled document of wartime life”

  — Gay Times, London

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  ISBN 0854492372

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  Richard Zimler

  UNHOLY GHOSTS

  Worldly Jewish, even a basketball player, an American guitar teacher seeks a new life in Portugal after the death of so many friends. But the plague still pursues him there, when his most talented student tests HIV-positive and threatens to give up on life at just twenty-one. Desperate to show Antonio that he still has a future, ‘the Professor’ arranges a car trip to Paris, where the boy can have lessons with a leading virtuoso. Antonio’s father Miguel, a stonemason by trade, insists in coming with them, and en route the three fall into a triangle of adventure, violence, and at last a strange redemption. Written as a letter to the Professor's ex-lover Carlos, seeking to draw him out of the closet, Unholy Ghosts is at once wise and zany, wittily funny and deeply moving.

  Unholy Ghosts was written with the help of a US National Endowment for the Arts fellowship.

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  Joseph Geraci

  LOVING SANDER